Skip to main content

tv   Book TV  CSPAN  November 4, 2012 7:00am-8:00am EST

7:00 am
>> next, howard wasdin discusses his book, "seal team six: memoirs of an elite navy seal sniper." esther watson spoke about the book and took questions from the old for the book audience and fairfax, virginia. this is about an hour. >> thank you. things for the introduction and tanks for the naval order for having me. before we get started i want to cover a couple things. i don't have the capability -- can we turn the volume up over the wall there somewhere? you in the back who supposed to be taking care of this, yeah, turn the volume up. [laughter]
7:01 am
okay. i think they're working on it now. is that better? what if i do that? is that the better? okay. just like in the seal team. if you want something done, you do it yourself. before i've said best selling author, before i get started, anybody who is a veteran or active duty, would you please stand up? give them a round of applause. [applause] thank you all for your service. so before we get started now on this glamorous navy seal road, which really isn't as glamorous as it sounds, and i'll show that you any minute, just the advice, everybody just that, even if they are not a navy seal, their service, their dedication was every bit important. so thank them for their service. but before i was a best selling author, before i had two, three
7:02 am
books are back before -- we are now in 26 countries and 17 languages but i was a bestseller all over europe. just got back from european tour and i'm sitting in my office they day, and brad pitt and vin diesel call me up. and they're fighting them there in a bidding war to buy the movie rights to my book. of course, my wife is sitting there being a big brad pitt and saint go brad, but anyway, vin diesel outbid bread and so i went with vin diesel instead of brad pitt and a wife is still got upset about that. but before all that happened, before i was part of this elite counterterrorism team, i had a much humbler beginning. and that beginning started like this. i was born two months premature to a teenage mom who are just turned 16. our member going to bed hungry
7:03 am
many nights before the age of seven, at which time i was adopted and raised in an abusive environment. beaten by stepdad. so if i gave you all that and told you about it when they would accomplish all things i would accomplish, you would say how. and some people could say, just because you have a lot of determination, maybe it's because you just had a big heart, maybe it's because you had a lot of drive. i submit to you, you could have all those things and still never comes what i've accomplished without one thing. folks, the results able to publish that is because i had the blessing of being born into the greatest country in the world. you can all applaud on that. [applause] the greatest country in the world where no matter where you were born, how poor you are, where you come from, your mama was, though your dad was, that you were still able to achieve what you achieved. and the reason that is is
7:04 am
because of the people who came before me who fought and gave us that right. and i think we're losing sight of that right now. i've never been as afraid for our country as i am right now. i'm very every four country right now, but we've got to hold onto the greatness that we had. let me give you a little background. you have to know when you're winning. while that sounds like that's self-evident, it's not. when i was in seal team six, i really thought i was winning. you know, i was iced the low drag we call it. chicks docket. you remember of an elite counterterror you know, working with the best people, and i thought i was when because i was a member of this elite team. will, from a counterterrorism standpoint i was. but for their personal standpoint i wasn't. i was a terrible husband, terrible father. i couldn't serve two masters are
quote
7:05 am
by no later to psychology and wasn't able to like divide that it. said something that each at an early age. i wasn't able to do that. i do like serve one master and, of course, my master was the seal thing. so you to find out, you determine for himself what is winning. and if you think you're winning, weekend like take this across the board. are we winning as a nation? are you winning as an individual, are you winning in a relationship? and easily to answer that question is to find what you want to accomplish. what do you want to accomplish? then you can define if you're winning. this young man here is, those of you have read the book know this story but i will cover for those of you who don't. this young man here didn't have the good grace, the blessing to be born in the united states. he was born in mogadishu, somalia. i was out one night and those you don't know what a safe house is come a safe house if we could
7:06 am
deep into enemy territory. uk residents, a house in this case, an apartment, whatever, and you pay these agents come you going with the cia. uk these agents to come in and out of the house, gather information for your and based on the information you act on that intelligence. we were running a very, very successful safe house in mogadishu, somalia. so successful in fact that we're able to get food all of the city, get most of the bad people who were like responsible for the civil war. but one that why was up on the roof of this safe house i smelled this horrible smell. and i'm not going to gross anybody out there, but if you've never smelled human flesh rotting come it's not like roadkill. it's like corba. it's like not eating them like he just got it away from. but i smelled the smell, and i'm like, tomorrow we've got to fight with his and get rid of
7:07 am
it. the next morning i come upon the roof, which is where we would watch for agents coming in and out, and protect them as they're coming in and leaving the safe houses. and it didn't smell anything. so i'm like and what is that? maybe somebody was blowing through the neighbor something. the next i am up on the roof and i had this same smell again, and again it's like what is that? that that would put on our night vision goggles and go down there, walk around the perimeter of the courtyard, and we see this little boy sitting right there where you see him on that bed. if you look you see the little behind but that's was walking when i found them. i saw the little boy laying there, and what had happened, this young man was going to school, 12, and stepped on a landmine on the playground. because the smaller so if you can enter summit at an early age, you won't have to fight them later in life. so all those things in life we take for granted in the united
7:08 am
states, going to school, getting an education, just by no other virtue that we were border, nobody here deserves to be in america. nobody here before you were born, god elli contessa said you're good to go, you're cool, you're good, you deserve, you get to be an american. by the grace of god we're americans. this young little guy was born in one of the worst environments possible, into a country where you're going to starve to death probably, get cholera and a bunch of other diseases, probably, and if not you might get maimed. so as bad as he just told you my childhood was, okay, i got beat with a belt, okay, i went to bed hungry a few times because i was born to teenage mom. okay, my life is pretty bad. let me tell you something. nobody into the most people in here have never had really bad. this guy has it that. now he's lying there dying because his right foot blown off from his left foot is partially
7:09 am
blown off. he is lying there, he has gangrene and now he is dying a slow, miserable death. of course, being americans what do we want to do? want to help the kid, right? but don't really want to help the kid? i'm running a safe house. i'm in the middle of bad guy territory, everybody around me is hostile. i'm risking the lives of my agents and my team if i help this young man, because that's not my job. my job is to gather intelligence, get rid of the bad guys, and do what's needed to be done to take care of our business. being raised in the south and being a christian, i had to make some hard choices. and when they do we do call asking for what's called compromise a three to help this young man, you guys just don't know. that's basically putting your career on the line. asked the captain who just
7:10 am
introduced me what that means, but, you know, you're not supposed to do. i'm willing to sacrifice me, my guys lives, to go help this one kid who might be al qaeda for all i know. i don't know who this kid is. made a radio call, compromise authority was denied. you can't help a guy. two nights later i'm back upon the rough, and not only is the smelled worse now, i know what's going on now. my heart is breaking. then i start hearing this month. and i didn't come here to depress everybody but if you've never heard a knowing of somebody dying, that is the most heart-wrenching thing you've you've ever heard. imagine a 12 year old having that moment. after that, one more night i couldn't take it anymore. so what we did, do you think i knew, and we have a saying in the seal team, my wife a typical this one on her, but it's better to ask for forgiveness than permission. so what we did is we all suited
7:11 am
up, got our -- imagine for big men kicking in your door, coming in with submachine guns, faces all blocked out. they're coming in, grabbing you, you and you, and putting you in like scouts and lining up against the wall. then you hear your son in the next room screaming. do you think just for emissaries of god is coming to help you? so anyway, what we had to be because like is that we did know they were, so we flex cuffs them, put them against the wall and what we have to do to this young man is what's called the egregious wound. was literally had to scrub out the necrotic or to teach you. pop them with some ivy, give them a couple of shots and and for some bandages on him. kept the flex cuffs. like scouts article and catch up on people. take the gags off the people and leave. happy ending, right?
7:12 am
no, there's not a happy have ended up with to change bandages and to all kind of follow-up care. so the next night, what do you think we did? [laughter] kicked in the door again, coming, just like we did the night before, took you, you, you and you and put you into flex counts, but you from into a corner, documented, scrubbing down again and everything. gave them a couple of shots, couple more ids and cut off the flex cuffs and left. so by this time can you probably know these people know that we're helping them, right? so what do we do the third night? who thinks we did the same thing again? you're setting a pattern but you've got to skip and it. they might know you're coming. you're not a tactical genius, i can tell. so we skipped tonight because if they were the bad guys, we skip tonight for two reason. first of all, without an interpreter to come in with us this spoke their language, and we also did want to set a pattern because we coming
7:13 am
tonight general, and if they were the bad guys, there could be a trap for booby-trap or whatever. so we skipped and i get third night he come in, kicked open the door, and everybody is down like this with their hands -- [laughter] so there's no grabbing them putting him in flex cuffs and everything that one lady sitting in the house, the lady of the house, had a cup of tea, or had a tray of tea she held out. this is key. i found out through my interpreter later, this is gratitude. that his family had spent everything they had to buy that key force. -- key for us. giving us everything you got means a lot more. these people gave everything they had. what they had was enough money to buy that key, and they have that force. this time at our interpreter with us were able to talk to them.
7:14 am
we find out their part of a good clan we're helping. found out that they did have a witch doctor who is like doing so little potion for the kid and everything, and that wasn't working. that's how we found out about the t. we show them how to do the wound care, give them some and a box and pretty much let them take over from there. so my lesson to you there is, sometimes you've got to do the right thing, regardless if someone tells you it's the wrong thing. you've got to do the right thing. just because someone might look like you're and make him sound like you're in or whatever, they are not necessarily your enemy. what i hear all the time when i tell this story is, doctor wasdin, we've got people in the united states and the care, health care, food. i've had been hitting in the face with the. you yourself are hungry as a young man, don't you think we're to be spent all of our time and resources taking care of that and said taking care everybody else?
7:15 am
do you know what? i've got the answer for myself the you've got to have that answer in your own heart. but i'll tell you what, i doubt there's one person in this room that i could take you to some of the places i've been, let you see a starving child, let you see a child dying that you could help, and then you answer that question. because then it's personal. it's not just using it on television. then it becomes personal. so get back to winning the eye know i was winning them. the little guy lived, and after i was shot up later on during the whole battle of "black hawk down" battle everything, i asked my cia buddy to get in a wheelchair. so that was a happy ending, so i wouldn't be. no so easy is for howard wasdin to know when he is winning when he's on a mission. when he is on offer whatever. look at his picture here. the next time you think that oh, boy, we really have it rough as americans, i want you to do something. l. into the bathroom, go into your kitchen, go outside, turn
7:16 am
on a faucet and watch what comes out. water. potable water that you can drink. and i'm not being funny but i'm not being facetious. there's something as simple that we've had so good for so long that we miss the big picture to look at this picture here. that's a four year old pouring water over the head of an 18 month old. when we first found these two little girls can they both had cholera. economic going to discuss what cholera does to the human body but it's not pretty. it in case you and dehydrates you and eventually die of dehydration. your heart can't even be. these two little kids had cholera so we vaccinated them. that we had to show them where to go to get the good water. later on we show them how to boil water to make a clean. so when you wake up tomorrow, before you start thinking about how bad you got them how bad we have as americans, and how our
7:17 am
country is just like going down the tubes or whatever, go into turn one on and see what happens. see right here? that the girl watched herself, brushed her teeth are i watched them, washer lawsuit to prevent had to go get more water for her mom to wash dishes and then go back to get more water to filter cistern so they have drinking water. making the streets safe. i consider this probably our greatest mission in mogadishu, somalia. let me go ahead and talk about that for a minute. i know a big movie was made about "black hawk down," and i know the book was written and i know all that, and everybody looks at it and it's all hollywood. all you saw was the good guys versus the bad guys. it's not that cut and dried. what we were doing their, feeding starving people, finding a guy who had figured out that he could control people's lives by starving them.
7:18 am
and if you don't think hunger is a powerful tool, come go with me and let me have complete dominion over you for 40-45 days. he will do whatever i tell you to do for salty cracker. so we were making the streets safe. the food was getting to the people. these children who were starving competitive never seen a starving child, i can't even explain it to you. so we were doing the. we got rid of the bad guys, getting food to the people, safe house was running well. we apprehended the key militia people. this is what you don't get from "black hawk down." we had it won. it was one. we were down to just one guy left to get. we already had the first strings. we had all of the lieutenants on the day that all black hawk down to buckle happen, had the key militia. we have these new people that we didn't know how to pronounce the name it called al qaeda. a few years later we found that who they were but what happened? we left them over there without finishing the job, and a few
7:19 am
years later we paid a price because that became an incubation place for them. gave them a place to dream. so in the middle, all the you're watching a movie, seeing good guys versus bad guys and what you don't realize is we have turned a whole nation around. a whole nation around. feeding them, making the streets safe, teaching them how to drink water without dying, showing them how to take care of themselves, reestablishing a government, getting rid of the bad element. you don't see that in hollywood because guess what? you are all spoiled as americans to we're all spoiled as americans. you go there and it's time to sit and watch a movie and you think you know what's going on and/or. we are the most self-centered nation. we've had it so good for so long. if we don't open our eyes come if we don't start looking around, if we don't start paying attention we're not going to hold that distinction for very long. this is what it looks like now in somalia.
7:20 am
that's what it looked like when i got there in 1993. we've changed that. now unfortunately this picture was just taken last summer. that's what -- that's what it looks like now. because we didn't finish the job. let me tell you something. i'm not a political person but i'm going to talk to you today about presidents, republicans and democrats. i'm a teamwork person. and by not finishing the job there as a team, we were still stuck with this problem today. these people are still starving but you saw pirates because somebody's populated ratings split a little bit in the polls and we decide to duck tail and run. regardless of what anybody here thinks about our involvement in the middle east, iraq, afghanistan, whatever. i don't care what your views are on that, you've got to realize this, if we don't finish the job, it will come back and bite us. now, talking about what i know when and winning, you've got to
7:21 am
know when you're not winning. god decides to let -- ending the hardheaded south georgia redneck i was, he had to go the extra mile to show me when i was in winning. and every once in a while, god will throw you again future. >> -- a game changer. >> bee[inaudible]
7:22 am
>> he is hit. key is hit. >> he is going down. he is going down. >> we have a "black hawk down." we ever "black hawk down."
7:23 am
we have a bird down in the city. [inaudible] >> move quick. >> wind up bird went down and real quick on that clip, when she can use a young man hanging out the guns when everything you see somebody from hollywood. that was my best friend, and bush, who died in a helicopter crash. when you look at this and you think that's just hollywood, that's not just hollywood. there's real people there. so what happened after that helicopter went down, and my hubby with colonel mcknight, we started going to crash the. keep in mind the type of man i had become. i will share this with you. i had become so cocky, so
7:24 am
arrogant and so into just being a key member that i did not even associate outside the circles. think about that. i am tailor-made for this. abusive childhood and never anything really told onto, no nurturing, so finally i get team, i getting that i consider my family so i make that the center of my world. if that's good to be the center of my world on going to be best at a i can be. so after the seal team two, then going to seal team six, then going to seal team six to be a sniper, on the cream of the crop as far as. >> ops go. under, i'm time when i watch people get injured around at which people get shot on either side of me and i never got a scratch. seven and 52 sky guys, never sprained an ankle. i was a freak of nature. that stuff doesn't happen. either heard someone. none of that ever happened to me because i was tactical god.
7:25 am
well, god decided on october 3, 1993, to show me that i was tactical god only as long as he allowed me to be. first time i got shot was at the hotel, olympic hotel when we were taking the prisoners out. i got shot behind a left knee. and does anybody here know what i saw when the first bullet hit me? can anybody here guess? i will give you a free book if you guess. give me a hand. what did i guess? [inaudible] >> anand a wakeup yeah, that's close enough. it was going on howard wasdin and i got shot, are you joking? that happens to other people. second and i got shot was when we were trying to get over to the 61 bird. that one almost blew my right byrd offered at the time i thought hey, these guys are serious. the third time i got shot when i had my leg propped up on the dash try not to bleed to death out of a rightly, that i got shot to the top of a left foot
7:26 am
that's like i was okay, got, what are you trying to tell me? i'm back to being human. at that point, to the point i thought i was superman. and at that point i had to learn something, that i was only human. here's what i struggled with. after that. white people who were better than me, why did they live, or why did they die and i was allowed to live. dan busch, my best friend, was day. why did people are better men than me, why are they did and god allowed me to live? i came back with a sickness that i didn't know i had called survivor's guilt. will talk about that in a minute but let me bring you up close and personal to cope with these people. you see me sitting there after i'm shot up in a hospital in germany, that's a happy ending there, right? i just lost my career. at that point i did know it was going to lose my leg. almost died later of a staph infection. going through a divorce.
7:27 am
every thing i had become lost some good friend, everything i had was pretty much gone that quick. just because i had everything concentrated in one direction and that wasn't well rounded. so when i was sitting there after all said and done and i'm in a wheelchair, suffering from survivor's guilt, feeling sorry for myself, all these bad things are going on and i got my9 millimeters and one lap think you know what? maybe eating a bullet is better than what i'm going through. think about what a sad state of affairs you've got to be an. i talk about going from rockstar to rock-bottom, just that quick. the reason was, is because the light didn't move away from me. i moved away from the light. and climbed into a bottle, became an alcoholic. i was unable to have a stable relationship for about 12 minutes because i was a member
7:28 am
of seal team six. i didn't ask for help because real men don't ask for help it i will do the right now that's the biggest like anybody ever told you. if you were raised like i was, by someone telling you that real men don't ask for help, real men don't talk about their problems, real men tough it out, you might be making your life measurable. and if you're not, i promise you, you are making your families life mr. kibble, speaking from experience. let me bring up close to perfect a couple people here, this way you will see some real people. the guy that you just are going down, chief warrant officer wolcott, he has -- we call him the velvet elvis the in anybody guess why we call it helicopter pilot velvet elvis? heard somebody back there. why isn't? -- wide easier to? i'll show you why this is why we call the velvet elvis.
7:29 am
♪ ♪ lord almighty, feeling my temperature rising ♪ >> and as good as that sounds, this man can sing as good as the king himself. although he was a great elvis impersonator, i've got to get to my favorite part -- ♪ ♪ ♪ i'm looking around the screw. there's kids in this group had never even heard of elvis, i can tell. >> that song, hogan-howe by burning love you imagine this guy showing up. showed up, picked us up in new orleans can we get into his black hawk county's going to fall country flies to fort campbell, kentucky, it wasn't a to all get into that counted all
7:30 am
spread out. what is with all a down in the back of the black hawk, all sprawled out take a nap or whatever, then he takes to click to which make the aircraft go up and down and he'll pull it up and push it down, pull it up and push it down so you're bouncing off the wall, the florida keys laughing in the front singing elvis. [laughter] and that's something that hollywood can't show you because that doesn't sell. that's not dramatic. that's not rambo. but that is one man making a difference. tell you what else he did. before he died, we were out of ammunition on the ground. when we get pinned down in these pilots would come down and fly low over the enemy's head just to get them to shift fire off of us long enough. t. but my comp they are out of polls. they can't defend themselves but they are flying down low over their heads to take the fire off of us long enough for us to maneuver.
7:31 am
think about the law but that takes. while ahmad that for a minute, somebody's going to ask this question from going to quit and take it away from you. dr. watkins and had to go from being a sniper to being a doctor? how do you go from being a sniper to being a chiropractor? to have to ask the question means you don't know the heart of special operative part of a man like this. people don't become sealed the people go by, task forces 61 putts because what the wind up killing machines. they do that out of love. they do that out of love for their fellow men. they do it because i want to be in the position to save your life, if the time to ever really bad and somebody needs to come get you. i don't want to do because i want to go kill bad guys. i want to do because i want to be the one making a difference, helping out, but my life the line for you. so by the same token that i was a sniper, willing to die for
7:32 am
you, i could be a good doctor willing to help you because it's all love. but the short answer is, ice deal put people out of their misery, just in a different way off mike it back to this one person make a difference, hollywood and billionaires. this is what really disgusts me, and most of us here will never be hollywood stars but most of us are will never be billionaires. but look at the one guy i just told you about. normal guy, chief warrant officer wolcott. he made a big difference in a lot of people's lives. let the warren buffets of the world complain about they are not paying enough taxes. and, finally, if mr. buffett wants to complain about not paying enough taxes and why doesn't he just shut up and write a check and pay more taxes? anyway, got sidetracked. bitingly, the way we overcame adversity and we went to overcome adversity now, and we are faced with some adverse conditions in the united states, unemployment the eye turned 50
7:33 am
this year, and in my lifetime i've never seen unemployment like this but i do think people look for a job. i employed the people at my clinic and i bet i get 15-20 resumes a week for overqualified people looking for a job. those are scary times. we are living in some adverse times. and on top of that we've got all this big dent in everything. and as corny as this sounds, let me take this, teamwork is the way we get out of debt. not us against them, not them against us to the democrats and republicans, how do we begin to this point in a country where you either had to be a democrat or he had to be a republican? you have to believe all of what these people think, or you have to believe all of what these people thing. you can't take it in slices. i kind of little bit of what you think of the what you think because now we are a two-party nation. that is our demise. because you can say okay, well, take this guy and -- and
7:34 am
everybody is one about congress? that's my question, too. we might have to have a president who was republican. we might have had to present as a demographic apathy people up in congress that will blindly follow a president along party lines regardless of what's right without us and teamwork there? jugular, i say we take fielding sex up to capitol hill, you may charge for two weeks, make sure they attend mandatory teamwork classes that make them do some push-ups, both of them again, and get this country back straightened out. [applause] you guys are to talk about aircraft drawn fire. okay, think about that. think about somebody willing to risk their life to run up to draw fire away and be shot at. now, we've got people who are afraid to do with what's right because you have to of party affiliation. i'm a democrat, i have to think like that or i'm a republican, i have to think like this. and if you don't, you're not
7:35 am
doing what's right for the country, you're not doing come you're not playing as a team because he or thing you care about is what? being reelected. that's all i care about, i'm a career politician, let me stay on the public did. give me the life of luxury i'm used to. i don't worry about health care. any of you in your, google into any other other congressmen, senators give for healt health e but look at the retirement. do you think they really care? i'm sure there's some out of the cavity know what care most about? they care about being reelected and to be reelected they have to stand and one guy. my point to them and my point here is this. i'm glad this is on c-span, teamwork. we got to get back to teamwork. is what made america great. it's what's gotten us through two world wars and countless other conflicts. teamwork, and as corny as that sounds if we can get these necklace up here in the beltway to start like playing as a team and putting you, ask first as americans, and what's right for america instead of what's right
7:36 am
for their party, we would pull out of this nosedive we are in. i told you about losing my friends, going to my survive ago, the low point knowing you need to ask what? what about our politicians asking for some help? and listen, i backed president obama when he took out osama bin laden. and listen, if you're an obama fan or not, here is the irony of the situation but president obama and president bush acted as a team to get osama bin laden. i see some funny faces no. let me explain that he. they didn't plan on working as a team, okay? just happened that way. president obama did have to make the gutsy call to violate another nations foreign sovereignty to go in and take this man, and you get right. he didn't tell them we're coming. i guarantee if somebody would've been waiting on us. but he admitted that he wasn't
7:37 am
for waterboarding. guess what? president bush okayed waterboarding that broke ksm that told him what occurred was that was going through the compound. so it took both presidents doing what they thought was right and an active teamwork that they didn't know they were doing to get the job done. but why is it considered a weakness for one party to ask another part to help about? or how simple is this? i really don't have all the answers. i'll to you what, if we can sit down and like talk to some of us, maybe we could come up with that. but that's not what are as a country anymore, and i'm afraid i'm and i might be wrong, i might be out of touch, but i'm afraid, i see one of 50 patients a week to kind of elitist, i'm afraid what i like being divided as a nation just because you have to be a democrat or a republican. you have to be left, you have to be right. i'm a retired navy seal. you guys on all that i was the
7:38 am
most conservative individual that ever walked. i'm not. i'm a team player. i'm all for teamwork. there's something sacred with over here on the right, there's some things i agree with on the left. out to you one thing, i don't think anything should be ran down our throats i think ought to be bipartisan and when you're casting your votes, and i hope that when you leave your you talk to people, the one thing we've got to get at here is, i really don't care who the next president is. i'm at the point in my voting life at 50 where i vote for the lesser of two evils. i like this guy a little less than a likeness or a little more than this guy. okay? so i'm not appear to pump you up on one side or the other i'm up here to pump you up on one thing, and that's teamwork. so when you're voting for your local reps, we are voting for your congressman or senators, find out from them has this guy voted along party lines every single time come hell or high water? he doesn't care what his constituents are saying, he cares about following his party.
7:39 am
that's the teamwork am talking about. we got to get back to that point. now, in the seal team six that was one reason that we would not win. there is one primary reason, and it was always a communication problem. it could be on the wrong radio, back into, the target is not at location but it was always a reason why that there was a communication problem. not able to get a satellite feed, not having an interpreter there with us. we've got to start communicating in this country. set up. i keep coming back to the. i'll quit all my politics. don't look -- anyone tell me for fact we've had one president that was all good? does anybody here know what? i'd like to hear it. does anybody here know one president -- okay go with exception of jimmy carter. [laughter]
7:40 am
sorry. what we've got to do is to be informed with got to be acted on my keynote and i'm a dork because i had. is this guy going to be taking a door was when we do, that's an insider term for you who don't know the seal think of them when you do have your door kickers, those are the people are willing to go to the metric these are the people who are willing to come in and take a boat for you. when you. when i say that, i mean it literally jump off jump off of you to take a bullet for you. that's what we've got to have. what we've got that in this country are people who are formed and not blindly follow somebody who are easily on the letter he's over on the right. also, affiliation aside, let me tell you a story. there used to be this huge rivalry between the seal team six guys and the delta force guys. we are better than you. you are better than us. or you are better than we are this and we're better at this. guess we started to? general garrison put the seal
7:41 am
team six guys with the delta force guys, made us spend time together, which is more reason why we need to go send seal team six up to capitol hill, made us spend time together. i was in red team, he made red team go hang out with charlie squadron, train with them, did you know them, learn from the. all my god, what. do you know what happened? we all got better. if we would do that in this country, if our politicians do that and we would do that with our neighbors, if we would do that with christians and muslims, oh, my god, if we do that as individuals and learn that hey, it's not just my way, it's not just my belief that it's not just what i think, regardless of who you are, where you come from, what you've done, you will improve. our nation will improve. we will improve as a people, as a society. getting back to finish the job i want to run past a couple of parallels with you. when the blackhawk went down from you just saw it on the
7:42 am
screen, that block off went down and for the record having so much trouble is we couldn't get a search and rescue bird in there because we didn't have one because they weren't in the loop and they were way out. and a vodpod and we took down the compound and took out osama bin laden, everybody here knows the helicopter went down, right? another "black hawk down." guess what the lesson learned was. have a standby helicopter ready to go in and take those people of the that's a lesson learned. you've got to take the same lessons learned and children combat them applied into law, and realize that, if i made this mistake in the past and it didn't work, why am going to keep doing the same thing? we've got to do that as individuals but regarded it as catheters and people could of got to definitely give them as a nation. does anybody in here have the one friend that no matter what's going on, going through divorce, you're having a bad day,
7:43 am
daughters dating somebody you don't like, i did using all his personal experience things here -- laughing does anybody here ever go through three teenage daughters? anybody besides me? that guy needs a metal. but anyway, everybody in your house that one person that you go to, no matter how bad things are, this is the person that you turn to talk to, that makes you feel better. back i saw in a helicopter, dan busch, let me take a little bit about dan. dan was a delta force member and the youngest delta force snipers of the that might not mean a lot to you guys, but at 25, to be in delta force them to be a sniper and to be in that position, to be that squared away, that column under par and that good of a christian guy, that no matter what when things went bad, he's the guy you turn to, that's pretty remarkable. he recently i've been in contact with his son to imagine a son who is not even out of diapers
7:44 am
when you die, who is now playing baseball in college. dan missed all that. and i guarantee you, hollywood is not going to show you that because that doesn't sell seats. and the reason i bring that up is, don't rely on hollywood, any of these billionaires, any of these movie stars, or most of these politicians to tell you the truth or about what's really going on in the world. this is something you got to do so. this is something you always of us americans. so when you get up in the morning and you do turn the water on and it comes out, you've got blessings you don't even think about like electricity. you know, you got to learn for yourself what you really are passionate about. you got to learn for yourself what's really going on in the world and not be spoonfed. sometimes if i want a good joke i will flip it over and watch bill o'reilly. and don't laugh, because innocent people like bill all right. i've done hannity show twice, but i straightened him out on both occasions.
7:45 am
but i will flip it over to bill o'reilly and just look at how and dried bill has got everything to end it was really that simple out be the happiest man in the world. but it's not. now, by the same token i would turn over to him over to msnbc and listen to them, and i'm like oh, moh, my god, how delusionale these people? because if i listen to msnbc, i would never have to shoot a terrorist or a bad guy in my life. would to a group hug, you know? probably smoke a joint, sing kumbaya and everybody would go home happy. unfortunate that's not the real world. as primrose thing, just like the thing bill -- somewhere in the middle is really an you can figure it out by yourself. by the way, i did try to hug a terrorist one time and it didn't work, so we had to go to the next level. i say all that to tell you this. here's what we've come come in our country. we have forgotten how to love. and i know nobody sitting in this room can you see a seal team six snyder speak about is
quote
7:46 am
going to get there and tell you what we're missing is love. that's because you don't know anything about seal team six. the men on seal team six, officers, ultimately people have a type of heart that you can imagine and out to you this, it's not a wind them up point in strata, let them be an assassin type art. it's the heart where i will die for you because you're an american. on any operation that i went on that ever say what affiliation, what color is their skin, are they male or female, none of that, at a muslim or christian. nothing. would be an american citizen but if you're an american citizen, guess what? i will die for you right now. imagine having it in your heart. that's which are military people have. that's what your counters and elite units have because they're going after and doing everyday, throwing themselves in front of bullets to safety. greater love has no -- than to
7:47 am
lay down his lif life for a frid of safety think that the seal team guys are just line them up, killers, robots, you're missing the whole boat and you don't know them at all. so by the same token that i was a navy seal, that's what i think i'm a pretty good chiropractor. and my patients feel the love when they come into my office. i've got so many patients now that i can hardly see them all. guess what? people can tell when you love them. when i was kicking in the door and scrubbing at his wound and handcuffing his. and he didn't realize that was lived so nowadays i can express my love a little different. in closing i want to leave you with an example of how i know love is what we're missing in the country. after got out of the seal team, i told myself i would never get married again because any of you have never been divorced know that's worse than getting shot three times to my divorce i was a bachelor for a long time. and god finally sent me the
7:48 am
right woman who convinced me that i could do something else with my life. i don't live in a bottle anymore. i don't have to take it on a prescription medications anymore. for pain, because i'm a chiropractor. that's a shameless plug for chiropractors. i've learned how to express myself besides just being point man on the team, or having to do something easy all the time. this is a lesson i had to learn. so me and that life, totally turned me around, save me from not just the world but for myself. we are in savannah, georgia. we live in our net savannah, georgia, but my wife is so special, she has to drive and a half to get her hair done. so i went with her to get her hair done, because that's how we diane anymore, so i am with her getting her hair done and we finished getting her hair done, and we leave and were driving down the street and getting ready to go to our favorite
7:49 am
restaurant to have dinner before we go back on, and it's starting to ring. i look over to the right, and there's nothing natural when you're sitting at a red light about looking and seeing somebody laying on their side in the rain, in the middle of the drive going up to a 70 limits on look over there and i see this older man, probably 75, maybe not federal complaint on his side. and i could tell he struggling trying to get up and is starting to rain harder. and i'm stuck at a red light. and i tell debbie, when the light changes we've got to go help this guy. well, for two seconds my heart jumped in my chest. two young men pulled up next to them, got out of the car, walked around to them, and i'm thinking, god, thank god, there's still hope for america but we still have love for each other. and my heart broke. one of the guys knelt down behind him and posed while the other guy managed to take a picture of this guy meltdown next to this guy.
7:50 am
then they changed positions, took another picture of the other that sitting down there, and high-fiving each other, got in the car and drove off. folks, if that had been a dog on the side of the road with a broken leg laying down, everybody in this room would've stopped and helped that dog. this was a human being. but a modicum that guy could've been whatever. folks, it's a human being. and if you're having to think that hard about it, then read up on the line again to love is what we're missing but we don't even love each other anymore to stop and look. let me finish my story. so when the light changed, fold over the next to him, got out, close the door. by now it is raining really good, real well. reached down, told him going to put my hand underneath your shoulder here, i'm going to such up and then we're going to stand up. and bring your bottom leg forward. and he's not doing to him that well whoa, this guy must be
7:51 am
drunk or crack out of his head or whatever, but i'm here now, we're going to get them out of the road, i don't care. so the reason the men could bring us bottom leg forward, as it turns out later when we were talking, is he had his leg shot off in vietnam. was hit right here. if you been shot seven more millimeters lateral, my leg would've been blown off. that man is a homeless alcoholic now. so i look at the man into simply for the grace of god there go i. if that bullet had been seven of his to the right on my leg, i already told you, i crawled into a bottle when i came back on, that might be kneeling on the street right there. granted him i was treated at lot better than the vietnam veterans were when i was. that i came back on, lost his family, after he lost his leg, became an alcoholic and now lives in a homeless shelter over
7:52 am
there. so the next time you see anybody need your help, no matter what might be, that might be a beggar, that might be somebody needs to. remember this, except for the grace of god, there go you. and go back to the first point of my powerpoint presentation. nobody in here did anything to deserve to be born in america. you were born into the grace country of the world with all the benefits that go along with us because god put you here. thank you all for your attention. i love you all very much. out of bless america. [applause] >> they asked me for a q&a. with a few minutes from answers. uses microphone to ask because they're taking. everybody has questions, please come forward and use the microphone now. boy, i must be pretty thorough.
7:53 am
don't be afraid. it's only c-span. what part of the microphone i didn't you understand? [laughter] >> what do you think about the latest, the book about the seals? >> i knew that was coming. my personal opinion on the latest book is a this is just my opinion, i don't begrudge anybody. if you do something actually sticking in your craw and he supposedly wants to set the record straight, that's one thing. i think this is after that rant though, but a lot of people in danger. not the least of which is him and his family. i think it should have been vetted. i had five drafts of my book, the last one, you know, general shelton look at. used the joint chiefs of staff, so i think if you're in a tenure going to write a book, i think you should at least go through, especially that second this is
7:54 am
life changing stuff. that's the biggest thing that's happened. in decades. i think that it should have at least had a look at by the people in the positions of authority, the pentagon or whatever. but yeah, that's something he did. and like i said, he was a member of the committees definitely earned the right to express himself but i just hope that everything turns out all right with this. my book was a no-brainer. 20 years after the fact almost. they already made a major motion picture and another book about it and those of you who read my book know it's not about dumping chester just like being up here today, not me thumping my chest and say hey look, i was in the lead navy seal sniper tell. it was about overcoming adversity. i hope that there's some good comes out of the book that he wrote, but to me it seems pretty politically driven. does that answer your question? next.
7:55 am
>> you mentioned training with the delta force. i wonder if he did anything with the australians or the brits? >> you haven't read my book. you would know these edgecomb yesterday my memoirs, that's something i cover in detail is training with the sbs guys. and don't do any of this, the sbs guys in australia, my personal favorite. great guys. there's a lot of other good special operations units out there but i just got back from a queue week european tour, and there's a lot of good guys in the world but america does not have the corner on the market after desperate there's a lot of other good guys out there doing a lot of good stuff. >> i just want to say you've made an impact on my life. it's an excellent -- [inaudible]
7:56 am
>> thank you very much. thanks everybody, for combat and i'm going to make myself available for about 25 minutes if you want to get you book signed, autocrat or whatever, i will be right outside. thank you for being a great audience. [applause] >> every weekend, booktv offers 40 hours of programming focus on nonfiction authors and books. watch it here on c-span2. >> could have looked at more but within the confines of the book you can only do so much. so we wanted diversity. we wanted democrats, republicans, we wanted different parts of the country. to some extent we wanted different ages. and we knew in the basis of nine, we can't make generalizations that are 100% certain. we say as much in the book.
7:57 am
because the conclusions are hypotheses that other people might not run with, but in order to make those kinds of hypotheses we need a third to first group. >> we also included women, there is the white house project that's been around for the last couple of election cycles, and they had eight in '08. so several of the women that the white house project have identified, several years before the 2008 election, olympia snowe, kathleen sebelius are both in there, and we wanted to also consider this notion -- barbara lee to with your server years ago when you did the last round, sixers ago with her foundation, have talked about looking at women governors, so we want to look at some of the women governors so then we went to some of her training as a pipeline to presidents. >> we also made the observation that when a male is elected to senator schiff, immediately he
7:58 am
is cast as a future presidential hopeful. for example, scott brown hadn't even been sworn in yet in massachusetts and the url scott brown dot -- scott brown twitchell.com was already purchased. but tommy women had been in washington for so many years as legislators and working on important work and yet their names never bubbled to the top. and we were curious why not? >> how did you decide you wanted to write this book? all three of you have done similar topics, but how did this book actually come about? >> your idea, ted. >> well, i guess it was my idea. i've been a political nerd since i was, you know, i don't, my parent's to remember my sister and i in 1960 staging a nixon-kennedy debate with our stuffed animals.
7:59 am
my elephant beat her rabbit. and during all those years of nerd dumb, what always fascinated me were magazine issues that would come out way in advance of the presidential election that would preview the eight or 10 or 12 people who ought to be considered, and it simply struck me after seeing so many of those issues and so many magazines that women were not making it onto that list. they were not being thought to be presidential. they were fought for some reason not to be a presidential timber. and so come as an academic you tend to ask, well, why? and that for me was the origin of the book. >> you can watch us and other programs online at tv.org. u..

212 Views

info Stream Only

Uploaded by TV Archive on